Current SACC status: Currently, Pterodroma defilippiana appears
on the SACC list as Masatierra Petrel. These footnotes are associated with the
taxon:

8. Pterodroma
defilippiana has been considered a subspecies of P. cookie
(REF).

9.
Called "Mas a Tierra Petrel" in Murphy (1936) and Carboneras (1992b).
Called "Defilippe's Petrel" in Sibley & Monroe (1990) and
"Defilippi's Petrel" in Stattersfield (REF). Also Howell et al.
(1996) noted that the species is named for F. de Filippi, so the name should be
"de Filippi's Petrel". The latter, however, is difficult to spell
correctly, and certainly confuses Chileans who know the Philippi's as the
ornithologists that had a large influence in Chile.

10. Pterodroma
cookii, P. defilippiana, and P. longirostris are
members of the "Cookilaria" species group, also including
extralimital P. hypoleuca, P. nigripennis, P.
axillaris, and P. leucoptera; they are considered to be each
others' closest relatives (Jouanin and Mougin 1979).

Background:

Historically,
there have been two competing names for this small 'Cookilaria' petrel,
both of which have spelling variants:

The
AOU (1989) added to the confusion by using the name "Juan Fernandez
Petrel," long established as the English name of P. externa, but
that error was quickly withdrawn (AOU 1990) and can now be ignored.

Summary of argument for proposal:

This
is a case of a taxon with two competing English names, one a name for a
breeding island (Masatierra Petrel) and one a patronym (De Filippi's Petrel).
Both competing names are associated with confusion. Masatierra Petrel is
confusing because of the interplay of the species' taxonomic history with a
now-discredited "Masafuera Petrel" (now known by the English name of
Stejneger's Petrel); Masatierra and Masafuera are names of two islands in the
Juan Fernandez group and easily confused with each other. De Filippi's Petrel
might be confused by Chileans with the Philippianas, unrelated early
ornithologists. Both competing names have confusing spelling variants.

De
Filippi's Petrel is a better name because (a) we are choosing an English
language name and the Masatierra/Masafuera confusion is grounded in foreign
language problems; (b) the species' breeding range is well beyond Masatierra
Island and, in fact, in may no longer nest there; and (c) all closely related
species are known by patronyms. It provides better symmetry for this taxon to
bear a patronym also.

Detailed argument in favor of proposal:

My
interest: I am the senior author of a paper (Roberson & Bailey 1991) that
unraveled some of the distribution and identification mysteries of the small Pterodroma
petrels. The paper was based both of extensive field work at sea in the eastern
tropical Pacific and off California, and thorough museum study, primarily at
USNM and AMNH (Roberson; supported by a Chapman Fund grant) but also in New
Zealand (Bailey). This paper was the first to clarify the distribution of P.
defilippiana (subtropical southeastern Pacific; no records for the northern
hemisphere) and the first to propose field identification criteria. Prior to
our paper, this species was considered essentially "identical" to
Cook's Petrel P. cookii (e.g., Tyler & Burton 1986, Dunn
1988). We showed it could be readily identified on a number of features,
including diagnostic tail pattern. Since our paper, the at-sea identification
of this bird has been further clarified (Spear et al. 1992, Howell et al.
1996).

Taxonomic history: This taxon was named for professor F. de
Filippi (Giglioli & Salvadori 1869). Numerous other 'species' in the group
were described through the late 1800s, from widespread points in the Pacific
Ocean, until Matthews (1912) lumped them all into a single species P.
cookii. Murphy (1929) reviewed the entire situation and concluded there
were actually two species: pale-headed P. cookii (including cookii,
nigripennis, axillaris) and dark-crowned P. leucoptera (including
leucoptera, longirostris, and hypoleuca). He called
the dark-headed birds nesting in the Juan Fernandez Islands the "Mas
Afuera Petrel" (P. l. masafuera) and used the name "Mas
Atierra" for the pale-headed birds nesting there (P. c. defilippiana).
He also described a new race -- P. c. orientalis -- for birds
collected off Chile but looked very much like nominate P. cookii of New
Zealand. Thereafter, Falla (1933) described Pycroft's Petrel P.
pycrofti and opined that Murphy's "orientalis" could
actually be immature Cook's Petrels on migration. It is now well-established
that P. cookii winters in the eastern Pacific and "orientalis"
has been suppressed (e.g., Imber 1985).

But
the confusion spawned by Murphy (1929) has cast a long shadow. He was initially
unable to place the taxon longirostris, described from a bird taken
at sea off Japan by Stejneger (1893), not having seen the type specimen, but
thought it likely belong to his leucoptera group. Soon thereafter
he referred five other specimens from the northeastern Pacific to longirostris in
his "leucoptera" group (Murphy 1930). Moffitt (1938) followed
Murphy's taxonomy by referring to birds taken off California (Loomis 1918) as P.
leucoptera masafuera. It wasn't until Falla (1942) that the birds off Japan
were shown to be migrant longirostris from the Juan Fernandez,
with longirostris taking priority over Murphy's "masafuera."
Yet the original label that the offshore California specimens were "leucoptera"
lingered for years. Even though they were actually Stejneger's Petrel P.
longirostris, some literature referred to them as White-winged Petrel P.
leucoptera (e.g., Pough 1957).

The
subgenus Cookilaria has likewise undergone radical expansions
and restrictions. Jouanin & Mougin (1979) lumped pycrofti with longirostris,
defilippiana with cookii, and brevipes with leucoptera,
and considered them to form a superspecies. They placed axillaris and
nigripennis as another superspecies, but considered hypoleuca to
be "distinct."

The
popular literature has hopelessly confused an already complex situation. The
widely influential Harrison (1983) confused defilippiana with Murphy's
discredited 'orientalis', and failed to include it in his original
guide. After I had personally pointed this problem out to him (in litt.), he
remedied it somewhat by including defilippiana in his next book
(Harrison 1985) but continued the confusion by showing its range to include old
"orientalis" (=cookii) specimens north of the Equator
and stated that defilippiana ranged to 12 degrees North. This was in
error; all specimens north of the Equator (indeed, all specimens of any of cookii/defilippiana group
north of 12 degrees South) are actually of Cook's Petrel P. cookii.
Finally, after yet another letter from me, a revised edition (Harrison 1987)
restricted the range of P. defilippiana somewhat (but still too far
north) but he painted an incorrect tail pattern and misidentified published
photos (we corrected these identifications in Roberson & Bailey 1991).

Evaluating name choice:

In
evaluating which of two competing English names should be used for P.
defilippiana, it must be recognized that the literature, both scientific
and popular, is filled with confusion stemming from Murphy's "Mas Afuera
Petrel "P. leucoptera masafuera" (now known to be Stejneger's
Petrel P. longirostris) and his "orientalis" race
of P. cookii that has been confused with P. defilippiana.

We
are evaluating the choice of an English name. To English speakers, "Mas
Afuera" is a foreign word easily confused with "Mas Atierra"
(sometimes spelled "Mas a Tierra" or, as you currently have it,
"Masatierra"). I consider that confusion to be as great to English
speakers as the alleged confusion associated with Chileans (in your current
footnote 9) in distinguishing between the Philippianas and Professor de
Filippiana. Even if it were just a choice between those two sets of confusion,
I would prefer the patronym because we are choosing an English name,
not a Chilean name.

But
the evaluation does not end there. P. defilippiana nests on the Juan
Fernandez Islands of Santa Clara and Robinson Crusoe; it is only the latter
island that is known locally as Mas a Tierra Island. But P. defilippiana also
nests on the Islas Desventuradas of the San Ambrosio and San Felix group, some
400 miles farther north. In this thus not restricted to "Masatierra"
Island (if spelt that way) and such a label is misleading. Furthermore, recent
studies (e.g., de L. Brooke 1987) suggest that the taxon is now extirpated from
Robinson Crusoe = Masatierra Island, and, within the Juan Fernandez, is now
restricted to Santa Clara Island. Referring to the bird by the name of an
island on which it no longer exists elicits additional confusion.

But
that is not all. All recent reviewers (e.g., Jouanin & Mougin 1979)
consider P. defilippiana to be closely related to three other small
petrels within the Cookilaria group:

P. cookii Cook's Petrel

P. pycrofti Pycroft's Petrel

P. longirostris Stejneger's Petrel

Given
that all of these have patronyms for their English names, it is both logical
and attractive that the fourth member of the group also bears a patronym, to
wit,

P. defilippiana De Filippi's Petrel

A word about spelling:

It
has already been noted that each of the competing name has been spelled three
different ways in the literature. It is not as if we have one non-confusing
name and one confusing name; they are both subject to confusion. P.
defilippiana was named after professor de Filippi but his name has been Latinized
in creating the species names, and has usually been Anglicized in creating the patronym.
As between the competing spellings of "Defilippe's" and
"Defilippi's," we (Roberson & Bailey 1991) proposed that the
former be "conserved" to avoid further confusion, but since our
publication, the term "de Filippi's" (Howell et al. 1986) and
"Defilippi's" have been used. I now consider "Defilippe's"
to be the inaccurate and withdraw any suggestion that it should be conserved.

This
leaves spelling choices: de Filippi's versus Defilippi's versus De Filippi's
Petrel. Consistent with the AOU practice in similar cases (e.g., Le Conte's
Sparrow), it seems best to retain as much of the foreign spelling structure as
possible. Thus a space between the "de" and the "Filippi's"
seems best. We are left with the question of de Filippi's versus De Filippi's
(with a capital "D").

Unfortunately,
the Le Conte's Sparrow example is not that helpful on this final question. John
J. Audubon named the sparrow for his friend Dr. Le Conte who, though of French
background, was born in the U.S. and used the spelling with a capital
"L" (Terres 1991). However, I believe it is standard protocol that in
lists of English language names of bird species, it has been AOU policy that
the specific name begins with a capital letter (stemming, of course, from the
general proposition that Yellow Warbler is preferred over the term "yellow
warbler" widely used by the non-technical literature). Further,
capitalizing the "D" would reduce any confusion by Chileans to the
Philippians.

For
all these reasons, I propose that P. defilippiana be known by the
English name of De Filippi's Petrel.

Literature Cited

American Ornithologists'
Union. 1989. Thirty-seventh supplement to the A.O.U. Check-list of North American
birds. Auk 106:532-538.

American Ornithologists'
Union. 1990. Errata to the thirty-seventh supplement to the A.O.U. Check-list
of North American birds. Auk 107:274.

Addendum from Roberson, 10/22: "one thing I failed to mention in
the De Filippi's vs. Masatierra name issue is that ALL research on the taxon
published within the last 30 years (or at least all of which I am aware) has
used some variant on De Filippi's as the name. The only recent usage of
Masatierra or variants has been European publications (e.g., first vol. HBW and
the Howard-Moore checklist), which seem unaware of recent research on P.
defilippiana. For just one more example, see the current detailed compilation
of Pacific seabirds at http://www.rosssilcock.com/4.htm

At
this point, I think De Filippi's (or variants) is "widely accepted"
within the seabird community and no one within that research community uses the
older and essentially discarded alternative, as far as I know. I think it is
only on your SACC list because you chose Howard-Moore as a baseline; their
impact on petrel names seems almost accidental. They are clearly out-of-touch
with the seabird community by using "Gould's Petrel" for Pterodromaleucoptera (the seabird world very broadly uses White-winged
Petrel, reserving "Gould's Petrel" for the nominate race if one
splits up this taxa) but that's a different issue, although not unrelated.....

Comments from Stotz: "NO. It is at times like this that I want
to abdicate our responsibility for English names. Like I really care what
a handful of people refer to an obscure gadfly petrel as. But of course I am
going to go on for a page about this. Like Van, I am inclined to stick with
older established names, so Masatierra gets precedent unless a compelling
reason can be shown for changing to something else. I am afraid that I don't
see any compelling reason for change. The arguments against Masatierra seem to
be; 1) confusion with Masafuera 2) not limited to Masatierra, and perhaps
extinct there; 3) not really an English name. My responses are 1) Masafuera is
not currently being used, and if birders can avoid confusing White-bellied,
White-bibbed, White-breasted, and White-throated Antbirds (among a million
examples), they can handle Masatierra and Masafuera. 2) People who can talk
about Connecticut, Tennessee and Nashville Warblers have no real right to
complain about the fact that a bird is not restricted geographically as much as
the name might imply. A couple of South American examples include Peruvian
Diving-Petrel and Mato Grosso Antbird. Pterodroma examples include Bonin, Trindade,
Phoenix and Kermadec Petrels, all of which breed on more than the island used
in their name. 3) This is a place name and we have dozens of place names from
other languages that we use as modifiers for bird names. Again Petrels have
some of the least familiar of these names including Trindade and Juan
Fernandez. It is not clear to me why a place name is less "English"
than the name of some random Italian.

If
we change to De Filippi's, I think Don is right that it should be De Filippi's
rather than the other possible orthographic variants. In terms of the first
letter being upper case. D'Orbigny's Chat-Tyrant and D'Arnaud's Barbet, both
named for people whose names were written with lower case d, are written with
capital D in everything I've looked at. My only question is whether De Filippi
is better than Filippi. I don't know exactly how Italian's treat
"de." In Brazil at least somebody who is "de something" is
usually treated as just something. Jose Maria is an example, he is almost
invariably alphabetized as Silva, not de Silva (although occasionally Cardoso
de Silva). Of course, Meyer de Schauensee is either the three names or de
Schauensee. So I don't know. Maybe somebody does?"

Comments from Robbins: "[YES] I find Roberson's rationale for
the change to be compelling. Clearly, he has spent a fair amount of time
thinking about this and I find the name "Masatierra" to be confusing
and uninformative. As shown by my past voting, I have no qualms about changing
names just because of "history". Hence, I vote yes for the change.

Comments from Jaramillo: "NO -- leave as Masatierra Petrel. Gosh,
I didn't think that there would be that much interest in this topic, but I
guess there is. Seabird enthusiasts, along with gull enthusiasts, are about as
avid as you can get! The more opinions the merrier as far as I am concerned.
Well let's start with what everyone knows by now, but which has to be well
understood. Both competing names here are confusing, neither one is a shoo-in.
On the other hand, the De Filippi name and its varying spellings has had a
wider circulation in recent years and part of the confusion on how to properly
spell it is due to plain old confusion as to how the Italian man (de Filippi)
spelt his name, and plain old not knowing how to spell the proper name (my
problem). Having led tours in Chile and having had to deal with Pterodroma defilippiana now for years
with birders it is obvious that this name is confusing and causes spelling
problems for most of us. I don't know why, but I keep misspelling it, perhaps
due to the trauma of watching the name unfold in so many various ways. Roberson
and Bailey (1991 -- see references in proposal) spelt it Defilippe's as he
notes, but they now think this was an error. So Roberson himself has found the
name to be problematic, as I have. Even in the new proposal there is a need to
concentrate on whether de Filippi's or De Filippi's is more appropriate,
rightfully choosing the latter in this case. I think that leaving out the
confusion that Chileans, or others who know the work of the Philippi's in
Chile, may face with this name it is still one riddled with problems. Also I
will mention that all things being equal I would prefer a name that tells you
something about the bird as opposed to a patronym. The name Masatierra Petrel
has had little use in the recent past, and I would argue that the different
spellings of this name have not caused nearly as much confusion as with De
Fillippi's. So, in summary. I would rather do away with the De Filippi's
problem by changing the name of this petrel, and hopefully begin a less
confusing future for the English name of this creature. I don't think that
Masatierra Petrel is confusing, even for English speakers and it sure has a
more pleasant sound to it. Also I should mention that we do have another
species Masafuera Rayadito that uses the name of the outer island in the Juan
Fernandez group and as such using Masatierra seems equally ok to me.
Furthermore the argument that this petrel does not breed on Robinson Crusoe
Island (Masatierra) is not proven, researchers I spoke to at the NOC seemed to
think that it does. The other local breeding island (Santa Clara) is actually a
satellite of Masatierra about a mile offshore from that island. In a sense
Santa Clara Island can be considered to be part of Masatierra when considering
that the third island (Masafuera) is 170 km from either of the former two
islands. I think that what one like's will be just a matter of personal taste
here, both names have their problems. Yet choosing Masatierra does the
following: removes a patronym, removes a series of confusing spellings and
names that have had people arguing for a few years now, adds a bit of geographically
information to the name, and it just plain sounds catchier to me."

Comments from Zimmer: "I vote "NO" for reasons
outlined by both Doug and Alvaro. I really do find the proposed name more
confusing (particularly the spelling), and less easy on the tongue, and I don't
see any compelling reason to change. I also think the geographic name is more
informative."

Comments from Stiles: "[NO.] De Fillipi's Petrel: this is one I
have no strong feelings about.. if nothing else, I would advocate Mas a Tierra
(without accent? In Spanish it would be M‡s) instead of Masatierra. Spelled
correctly, it's not really so misleading, and LOTS of Neotropical birds no
longer occur at their type localities!! In general, I favor using toponyms for
highly localized species as this calls attention to such distributions and to
their actual or potential vulnerability."

Comments from Schulenberg: "YES. What a lot of wailing and gnashing
of teeth over esoteric issues. Most of us don't give a rat's ass about Pterodroma
and what to call them. Given a choice between two problematic names, one of
which in fact has a rabid fan base (current seabird biologists/enthusiasts),
why *not* follow the currently more widespread name (De Filippi's Petrel)?
Sheesh."